The Confessions of Saint Augustine

By Saint Augustine

Catholic-ometer: 5 of 5

Enjoyability: 5 of 5

Yeah.  Big surprise here.  I had a feeling this would be my kind of book, even before I started reading it, although in fairness, I expected that the autobiographical nature of the text would really turn me off.  It certainly didn't, although I still preferred the theology sections of the book.

This is a book written, originally, by Augustine before he became one of the greatest saints, thinkers and philosophers of all time.  In it, he tells the story of how his sinful life led him to the heresy of the manicheans, and how, through careful thinking and intellectual honesty, he was eventually led back to the Catholic Church, and to a life of devotion and holiness.  It's a beautiful, true story.

Then, in about the last third of the book, he starts talking theology, and this is where Augustine really gets to show the depth of his intelligence.  I was thrilled by this.  I'm a big theology fan, and I loved hearing him talk about the workings of the mind, the memory, time, eternity, etc...  It's fantastic, because it encourages one to think on a much deeper level than we're accustomed to at this day in age, and yet, it all makes perfect sense.

There are Christian masterpieces that tell you only about the lives of poor sinners, striving to reach God, and other masterpieces, which tell you primarily deep truths about God himself, and his state of being and creation.  The first can be more instructive, in terms of leading us home, while the latter is, arguably, more delightful, since it pertains to the very creator and source of all delight.  I won't say which is better to read, but this book has both, so there's no need to.

Augustine's story is inspiring and encouraging, and his theology is rock solid and brilliant.  It's heady, intellectual stuff, though, so while I consider it one of the best books I've read in a while, and very difficult to misunderstand, I also can't really say it's for beginners.  It might be better to start with something a bit lighter, if you're not a theology buff.  My personal suggestion would be to start with "Rome Sweet Home," and some basic ancient philosophy, like Socrates or Plato, then move on to this when you've got all that down.

Captain America; The First Avenger

Rated PG-13

Catholic-ometer: 4.5 of 5

Enjoyability: 4 of 5

This movie is not specifically-Catholic, and doesn't mention any Catholic theology or major Catholic themes.  Regardless, I feel I should review it here, out of respect to certain elements of it, which impressed me from a religious and moral perspective.

I rarely watch movies in theaters anymore, because I just don't enjoy most of the ones coming out nowadays.  Still, I heard from a reliable source that this movie was good, so I checked it out.  I figured it might tingle my Catholic sense the way Spider-man 2 did, or it might not, the way Iron Man did.  Still, I knew there was a chance that it might really be good.  I love the true-blue hero types like Captain America, and I love the older comic books on which this kind of adventure is based, so I checked it out.

First, let me start off by saying that the movie gets a lot right.  A period piece set in the times of the 1940s near the end of the second world war, a wimpy little guy called Steve Rodgers wants to be a soldier more than anything, but no matter what he tries, he just can't seem to pass the army's tough recruitment guidelines.  Enter a military scientist; originally from germany, who promises to give him a chance to be in the army, by means of an experimental formula, which amplifies all the natural powers of his body to the absolute peak of human potential and, perhaps, beyond.  Rodgers undergoes the procedure and becomes Captain America; fighting in the war to protect his friend Bucky, and the other brave soldiers on the front lines.  Much action and adventure ensue.  This ultimately leads him into conflict with the Red Skull; a supervillain in charge of Hydra; a nazi splinter-group that uses advanced technology derived from a strange, recently-discovered power source.

The list of differences between this movie and the comics it was based on would go on for days, and don't really matter anyway.  In the comics, Bucky wore a costume too, but his role was otherwise the same, and frankly, I agree with this change.  Bucky didn't undergo the procedure, so it doesn't really make a whole lot of sense for him to be CA's sidekick in a movie like this one.

The content of this movie pleased me greatly in some ways.  There was relatively little cursing, the violence and death didn't get gorey (though in a story about war, there will never be a lack of death,) and the closest thing to sexual content was a woman yanking CA's necktie and kissing him.  The action is a little goofy at times, and overall, is has about the same vibe as a cartoon with more military types in it, which will appeal to some, and not to others.  I know some who were hoping this would be a legitimate war movie, but I don't see how it could have been.

The dialogue is rather standard fare, and the characters aren't terribly deep.  There's not much soul-searching, and the villain is rather two-dimensional.  In short, it wasn't Spider-man 2.  That said, I loved it, because this kind of storytelling really was popular a couple generations ago, when characters didn't have to be deep or excessively-complicated to be interesting.  Archetypes are strong and rarely deviated from in this movie, and I consider that a good thing, since when you get down to it, that's really what Captain America is about.  He's an archetype for the virtuous soldier.  Seeing him in that light, a whole slew of other things about the movie become clear.

On one level, the main character demonstrates tremendous courage, strength of will, dedication, humility and care for his fellow man, yet he knows what kinds of tough choices have to be made in a time of war.  He's moral to a tremendous degree, which is enough by itself to impress me, but the film has other things hidden in it as well.

In one scene, the doctor explains his reasons for choosing Rodgers as his subject; because he believed that strong men become used to their strength, and always want more, but weak men know the value of strength, and how to be good and true.  I don't care whether this was intended or not; this line sets up the rest of the movie as an allegory for Heaven; where only the most virtuous, couragious, humble people will go to be glorified, and receive new bodies, which can be used to help others.  That put a smile on my face when I thought of it in that light.

Still, the movie isn't without its downsides.  The hydra group takes center stage as the villains very early on, and seems to be just about the only group of nazis that Cap fights.  Maybe I misread that, but I felt like this was an attempt to sort of pidgeonhole our hero into his own little world, so he doesn't bother the rest of the war going on.  I would have preferred to see real nazis with real villain motivations, or even a thorough characterization of Hitler, but that might have been too much to ask for, considering the direction that modern world events are taking.

There's one thing I'm sure of; this is a good movie, because it's a movie about good people doing good things.  It's no masterpiece, doesn't go too far into its characters, and the war action is, I feel, disrupted a bit by the odd technology being thrown around, but it's still a good film, and that's so uncommon nowadays, that I don't feel it would be right of me to give it less than four stars in any category.  It may not be very thought-provoking, but it's got its soul in the right place, and I couldn't be happier about it.

Holiness is Always in Season

By Pope Benedict XVI

Catholic-ometer: 5 of 5

Enjoyability: 5 of 5

I guess it's no secret that I liked this book.  I love solid teaching about the faith and those who followed it, and you don't get much more solid than the Pope himself.  Telling you everything this book gets right would take all day, though, so instead of explaining everything I liked about it, I'm going to tell you what this book is, and what it is not.

This book is not a thorough history of hagiography, nor a sufficient biography for any of the saints mentioned herein.  It is a series of quotes from our current pope (Pope Benedict XVI at the time I write this,) about various saints and special feast days over the course of the year.

It gives a brief synopsis of the lives of many of the saints mentioned herein, outlines some of what they did, and points out various virtues, lines of reasoning, and approaches to the faith, which every Catholic should be struggling to emulate to this day.  By no means is this list of saints exhaustive, and a fair amount of additional research into the lives of those mentioned here would benefit an interested reader, even after putting this book down.  However, this isn't an encyclopedia of the saints; an endeavor that would take much more time, I'm sure, than the Holy Father has.

The practice of using the lives of the saints to instruct us all in how to grow in holiness is a very helpful one, and this book takes that tack to success.  In these times, many of us are forgetting how to look up to heroes; to watch in amazement as someone achieves true excellence, and to wish we could do it too.  I think too many fall into despair and fear that no matter what, they can never do what's needed, but these people; the saints are the real heroes.  They strove for true excellence, and eventually acquired it, and if we need people to follow the example of, or if we're afraid that our talents, strengths or personality will keep us from crossing that finish line, we just have to look at this great cloud of witnesses, and remember that it's not strengths, or talents, or personality-type that wins the ultimate victory; just plain and simple holiness.  This is what I take away from this book.

The translation is fair; somewhat casual-sounding and easy to read, compared to some of the pope's other writings.  That does make it a great deal more accessible.  I only hope no important meanings were lost in the translation process.

It was an excellent read, and if you ever need an introduction to saints or to saintliness, this is one of the best starting points you could hope for, short of reaching Heaven itself.

Rome Sweet Home

By Scott and Kimberly Hahn

Catholic-ometer: 5 of 5

Enjoyability: 5 of 5

This, for me, was an end-of-the-week book.  It's fairly short, and a couple hours of reading a day is all you need to finish it within a couple days.  It took me about three.  Fortunately, this is made easier by the fact that I didn't really want to put the book down.

This book is, in a sense, a sort of semi-autobiography of Scott Hahn and his wife Kimberly.  It tells the story of how they began as enthusiastic protestants, and how, through experience, study, honest thought, and more than a little divine grace, they managed to find the truth of the Catholic Church.

In addition to walking through several points that should be useful in defending the Catholic faith from protestant attacks, this book also recounts the events somewhat charmingly; dividing each chapter into the perspective of Scott and the perspective of his wife Kimberly.  This is important, since it helps to keep track of where each was in their spiritual development, and how long it took them to get there.

The journey of these two souls towards the truth is recounted very pleasingly; doing a very good job of explaining just how they arrived at one realization after another, and what factors slowed their growth.

The keyword for this tale, in my mind, seems to be "development."  I've always loved development in any good story; real or fictitious, and this book certainly has plenty of it.  There's an intellectual honesty to Scott that feels refreshing, and a prioritizing of emotions in Kimberly, which feels, at the very least, familiar to anyone who's ever tried to talk to a friend about the faith.  There's not much else I can really say about the book.  It has no missteps at all in doctrine, discipline or theology.  I consider it nearly perfect.

I say "nearly" perfect, because the foreward is written by Peter Kreeft.  I have mixed feelings about Peter Kreeft.  On the one hand, his understanding of theology can be excellent at times, and he really knows his way around a good metaphor.  On the other hand, he's prone to making mistakes as well, which don't seem to get sifted out in the proofreading.

Fortunately, the foreward to this book may be his best work yet.  I could only spot one semi-error, and even then, it may have just been flattery.  He claims that Scott and Kimberly use their bibles better than any other Catholic in the world.  Now, I'm sure they're way up there, but aren't there, for example, a good two dozen cardinals, some european theologians, and a very wise and talented pope who are also at least in the running for that title?  "Better than any other Catholic in the world" feels needlessly grandiose to me.

Still, even that can't ruin my day now.  This is a fantastic book, and I really enjoyed reading it.  If you're a Catholic looking for encouragement, or (better yet) a protestant seriously considering the Catholic Church, this is one of the best modern books you could pick up.

The Lord of the Rings (Novel)

By J. R. R. Tolkien

Catholic-ometer: 5 of 5

Enjoyability: 4.5 of 5

I'm essentially writing this review to summarize my thoughts on the series as a whole, and its overall quality.

I was very pleased with it; the heroic main characters, the veiled allegory for sin embodied by the ring, and the fights and struggles, which, while they sometimes seemed a bit slow, and sometimes seemed to skim right over the important parts, were, in just enough cases (like the Shelob fight,) exciting and well-done, and delivered a very thrilling experience.

I'm not as enamored with scenes of armies of men fighting as Tolkien seems to be, but I appreciate a good fantasy epic as much as the next guy, and that's what this story really is.  Too many men for its own good, in my mind, but still just enough presence by wizards, orcs, elves, dwarves, and especially hobbits to keep it all interesting and involving, despite some dry bits.

I can't really see much of anything about this story that would give people moral problems.  Even those with very extreme religious hang-ups (such as myself) will have a hard time finding anything to raise issue with.  There's magic in the story, but not in the "strongest guy wins" sense, which makes many modern pieces so problematic.  There's great evil, but it's always rendered as just as vile and repulsive as evil really is.  The main characters are small and weak, which only increases the excitement over how things turn out in the end.  After all, beating an enemy isn't all that exciting if he's weaker than you are.  Nobody likes a bully.

The minor issues that I do raise with this story primarily have to do with the very slow pacing of the story overall, and the way the narrative seems to lose its focus somewhat during most battles.  I think that Tolkien's main point during a large part of this story was to encourage people to see the beauty of this world he's created, which is an effort I can't raise issue with, though it ramps down the excitement somewhat.  I feel the movies struck a slightly better balance between beauty and excitement in their pacing, but the books were still a lot of fun to read, and I reccomend them very strongly to anyone who still believes in the fight between good and evil.

The Lord of the Rings Appendixes

By J. R. R. Tolkien

Catholic-ometer: 4 of 5

Enjoyability: 3.5 of 5

Finally, after finishing the last of the six "books" of the Lord of the Rings, there is a selection of appendixes at the back.  The appendixes provide some backstory for some of the races and characters, some information on the languages, cultures, family trees, etc, of Middle Earth.

Unfortunately, this section gets even drier than most of Tolkien's other writing; particularly when he discusses languages and historical records.  Still, it's not without it's high points, providing some history for Aragorn and Arwen, as well as some interesting stories about the dwarves and their feud with the orcs, and about the man after whom Helm's Deep was named.  There's also a passing reference to the Silmarillion, which I may also undertake one day.

Still, many of the characters in these parts of the story are vain, prideful, thirsty for revenge, and generally act out of self-centered motives, but they all suffer losses appropriate to their vices.  The only reason I even bother to bring this up is that there's no Gandalf-like central hero in these parts of the story; nobody to show how things should be done right.

The point and a half down in enjoyability come almost entirely from the fact that the appendixes read like an encyclopedia.  The content is very entertaining, but the format is not.  I don't feel there's any point in disguising that.